Buddha is a major character in the manga and anime series Record of Ragnarok, depicted as the founder of Buddhism who originally stands on the gods’ side but later defects to fight for humanity in the sixth round of Ragnarok.
Buddha is introduced as one of the gods’ representatives in the Gods vs Humanity final battle.
He shocks both gods and humans by publicly switching sides and becoming a fighter for humanity.
In this work he is treated as a “god-side representative” rather than a standard god, reflecting his origin as a historical human who attained enlightenment.
Among gods he is mockingly titled “the strongest problem child in human history,” while humans respectfully call him “Buddha.”
He is known for his catchphrases about absolute self-determination and for embodying “Heaven above, earth below, I alone define my path” in everything he does.
His role and outlook place him as one of the most thematically central characters in the series.
Name: Buddha
Series: Record of Ragnarok
Origin / Background: Ancient India, Buddhism
Role in Ragnarok: Initially god-side fighter, defects to the human side in Round 6
Catchphrases / Titles:
“Heaven and Earth, Only I Am Honored Man”
“The Strongest Problem Child in Human History”
No explicit height, weight, age, or blood type are given in the source material.
Buddha’s design deliberately overturns the traditional image of the serene, robed sage.
He dresses like an ultra-relaxed modern guy: tank top, sandals, sunglasses, and oversized earrings.
His hair is not a classic tight spiral topknot but a messy style tied at the back into a lotus-like bun, evoking a stylish, “street” version of a Buddha statue.
The overall impression is that of a chilled, fashionable older brother rather than an ascetic monk.
He always carries some sort of candy: lollipops, candy bars, gum, and similar sweets.
He constantly offers people candy with a casual “Want one?”, then either gives them all of it if they say yes or eats all of it himself on the spot if they decline.
With humans, he is surprisingly generous: if they accept, he hands the whole stash over.
With gods, he does the exact opposite—he refuses to offer, and even if a god begs for a taste he will stubbornly gobble everything himself, out of sheer contrariness.
This playful pettiness culminates in a bizarrely serious candy bar tug-of-war with Zeus, which he wins by eating the entire bar.
The behavior is silly on the surface, but also reflects a mix of ascetic discipline (never wasting food) and his deep-rooted anti-god rebellious streak.
Personality-wise, Buddha is extremely relaxed, irreverent, and unfiltered.
He casually calls beings like Zeus and Brunhilde with “-chan” style nicknames in the original, reflecting a teasing, overly familiar tone.
He is absolutely committed to acting only on his own will.
For him, labels like good and evil, god and human, ally and enemy are secondary to personal choice and internal conviction.
He does not move for anyone else’s agenda, even if their goals align with his.
Instead, he listens, shrugs, and decides based on his own standards: “If I wanna do it, I’ll do it. If I don’t, I won’t.”
He is extremely tolerant of others’ desires and flaws.
Even extreme ambitions or morally questionable dreams are casually brushed off as “That’s fine,” as long as they are honestly owned by the person themselves.
His core stance is: “If I live how I want, I won’t complain if others live how they want.”
Because of this, he despises gods and forces that try to impose “destiny” or deny the happiness that exists within people.
Brunhilde describes him as the “strongest adolescent in history,” combining boundless self-determination with that teenage refusal to accept any imposed role.
His behavior during Ragnarok leaves even his own disciples in a constant loop of shock, panic, and relief as he does exactly what he wants, consequences be damned.
A Prince Born With “Everything”
Buddha’s human life begins as Gautama Siddhartha, prince of the Shakya clan in the ancient north Indian city of Kapilavastu.
He is born into the Kshatriya warrior-noble class and enjoys the best food, clothing, palace, and education that his world can offer.
At birth, the sage Asita proclaims a grand prophecy:
this child is “the greatest among humans” and is destined to become a world ruler.
In other words, Siddhartha is born with a guaranteed, divinely blessed “perfect future.”
As prince, he fulfills his duties, helping his people across caste lines and performing his responsibilities faithfully.
He quietly accepts the “fate” handed to him: someday he will be a great king, and that is simply how things are.
The King Who Had Everything but Knew Nothing
Siddhartha’s life changes through his cousin and distant relative, King Jataka of the Malla kingdom.
Five years older and ruling one of the sixteen great states, Jataka gets along very well with Siddhartha.
Siddhartha longs for a real older brother and fondly calls him “Brother Jataka,” which Jataka half-heartedly scolds in public but secretly enjoys.
However, Jataka is fatally ill and fully aware that he is close to death.
During a casual walk, Siddhartha, believing Jataka to be the embodiment of a “happy king,” lightly remarks that Jataka is surely blessed.
Jataka’s response is unexpectedly heavy.
He reveals he will soon die and reflects on his life: his kingdom is prosperous, his people content, and there have been no major wars.
Everyone will undoubtedly say that he lived “a happy life” as a great king.
And yet Jataka confesses a shocking emptiness.
He knows nothing of the ordinary fried beans his people eat, the true destination of the river he sees every day, or the actual extent of the sky he rules under.
He then asks, almost to himself:
“Whose life was my life, really?”
He concludes that everything he had was “happiness given to him,” not something he truly grasped or chose.
He brushes off his own words moments later as “weakness before death,” joking that Siddhartha should forget them.
But the confession sears itself into Siddhartha’s mind.
Soon after, Jataka dies, and an enormous state funeral is held.
The people genuinely grieve, and officials remark that this sorrow proves Jataka was truly blessed and honored.
When someone says, “Jataka truly lived a happy life,” Siddhartha is hit with a mental flashback to Jataka’s own doubt:
“Whose life was my life?”
He realizes that from the outside, everyone is calling “happiness” what Jataka himself could not feel.
In that moment, Siddhartha’s perspective snaps.
He sees Jataka’s life, his own, his people, nature’s struggles for survival, life, and death all whirl through his mind in a shattering epiphany.
Then he laughs, a wild, liberating laugh, and quietly declares to himself that he has “arrived.”
He disappears after that, not even attending the rest of the funeral.
People assume that the king’s death crushed him and feel pity.
They glorify Jataka’s funeral as the pinnacle of a king’s happiness, unaware that Siddhartha no longer accepts that definition.
The Turning Point: Returning Happiness to Its Owner
As the funeral proceeds, Jataka’s coffin is honored with lavish rites, decorations, and high priests chanting for his soul.
Everyone believes that “no greater happiness” could be imagined for a king.
Then Siddhartha suddenly appears, scattering a shower of flowers from a large urn as he walks in.
Without ceremony, he picks up Jataka’s coffin and begins to carry it away, shocking the attendees.
The high priests and Siddhartha’s father are outraged, crying out that this is blasphemy and demanding he stop.
Siddhartha silences them with a harsh dismissal, saying Jataka needs neither their prayers nor the gods’ blessings.
He states that true happiness lies within, not in external rituals and labels.
Then he sets Jataka adrift on the river, so that even in death he can “see” with his own eyes where the river leads.
The dead king’s face appears, mysteriously, to be smiling as he floats away.
This gesture symbolizes Siddhartha’s rejection of imposed happiness and his decision to seek truth on his own terms.
Departure From the World
After this event, Siddhartha abandons everything.
He leaves behind royal robes, rank, family, wife, and child, and walks out into the world “like a rhinoceros horn,” alone and unbound.
He travels as an ascetic wanderer.
If he finds someone collapsed from starvation due to harsh practices, he ignores strict rules and feeds them milk porridge.
Sometimes he spends whole days resting peacefully under a great tree.
Other times he intervenes to save a young girl from being sacrificed to a god.
He simply lives as he wishes, and people he meets become drawn to him and begin to follow.
Before long, a massive crowd trails behind him—ragged in appearance, but happy and laughing together.
In this period he attains enlightenment and truly becomes “Buddha,” the awakened one.
He comes to see happiness not as something given by gods or fate, but as something people reach by confronting their own weakness and living consciously.
Meeting Zerofuku: Happiness, Effort, and Failure
One day, Buddha arrives in a city that is spiritually rotten to the core.
This place had once been blessed by Zerofuku, a god of fortune who removed misfortune from people’s lives.
Paradoxically, by stripping away hardship, Zerofuku created a disaster.
With no suffering to push against, the people abandoned all effort, drowned themselves in pleasure, and rotted in decadence.
Even Zerofuku, a god, is horrified and crushed by how far humanity has fallen there.
He cannot understand why his gift of fortune has led to such ugliness.
Buddha, however, remains unchanged.
He walks through the ruined city surrounded by his followers—who, though shabby, are clearly fulfilled and smiling.
Desperate and jealous, Zerofuku demands to know why Buddha’s followers look happy when his own beneficiaries never truly became happy.
Buddha firmly corrects him.
Happiness, he says, is not something that can be handed down.
It is something each person must arrive at by themselves, through struggle and awareness.
Where there is shadow—misfortune—there is the possibility of light—happiness.
By erasing all shadow, Zerofuku denied people the chance to walk toward the light on their own.
Buddha even reaches out a hand, inviting Zerofuku to awaken alongside him.
Zerofuku, however, is overwhelmed by his own sense of failure, jealousy, and hatred and slaps Buddha’s hand away.
Their reunion is postponed until the Ragnarok battlefield.
But this encounter defines Buddha’s view of Zerofuku as someone who, for all his mistakes, at least tried to confront his own weakness.
Before Buddha’s full involvement is clear, Loki begins to suspect something odd.
He realizes that the Valkyries’ ability to create god-killing weapons, despite being half-gods themselves, makes little sense under normal divine rules.
He recalls a technique from the Buddhist realm: “Ichiren Takusho”, translated as “Shared Lotus Fate,” where two beings join their lives and destiny to bring out their full power.
From this, Loki deduces that the Valkyries’ weapon-forging technique, the Volund bond with human fighters, must be based on this Buddhist power.
This suspicion brings Loki into direct confrontation with Buddha and the Seven Lucky Gods, who act as a divine purge squad.
The tension escalates to near-battle, with Kojiro Sasaki, Soji Okita, and Kondo Isami siding with Buddha.
Only the intervention of Zeus and Odin defuses the standoff, and Ragnarok continues for the time being.
Not long after, Buddha is officially selected as the god-side fighter for Round 6.
The Legendary Betrayal
Zeus personally nominates Buddha as the god representative for the sixth match.
Buddha accepts with a light-hearted “Sure, sure, sure,” as if accepting a minor favor rather than a cosmic duel.
He steps into the arena from the gods’ entrance, instantly horrifying the human spectators.
For humanity, seeing Buddha as an enemy feels like the worst-case scenario.
Then, in peak Buddha fashion, he just keeps walking to the center, borrows the horn from Heimdall, and casually announces:
“I’m fighting from the human side. Thanks.”
The arena explodes in chaos.
Humans go from despair to stunned hope, and the gods bristle with outrage and confusion.
Zeus, however, quickly calms the situation.
He declares that this twist is perfectly acceptable under the rules and even openly welcomes the dramatic development.
Zeus also admits he would love to fight Buddha himself, though he has already assigned the god slot for Round 6 to Vaiśravaṇa, the leader of the Seven Lucky Gods.
This choice sets the stage for Buddha’s fated reunion with Zerofuku and, ultimately, with Hajun.
Buddha, for his part, genuinely appreciates Zeus for allowing his side switch.
He even says he would have no problem if Zeus himself came at him as an opponent.
Deep-Seated Hatred of Imposed Destiny
Buddha’s hatred for “gods” in this series comes from his rejection of imposed happiness and predetermined roles.
He once had a “perfect” worldly destiny laid out for him as a prince and future king.
After seeing Jataka’s life and hearing his doubts, Buddha realizes that happiness imposed from outside is a lie.
A life where others decide for you—no matter how luxurious—is not truly yours.
He cannot stand beings who dictate fate and then call it “blessing.”
To him, real happiness means facing your own ignorance, weakness, and imperfection, and still choosing your path.
That is why he approves of Brunhilde, even though she is manipulative and full of selfish motives.
He respects that she owns her desires, is drenched in worldly attachment, and is willing to use both good and evil to achieve her goal.
He sees her desire as honest, not borrowed.
When she visited him before the Ragnarok council to learn about Shared Lotus Fate, he sensed she was already scheming to pitch him into battle against the gods.
Even so, he only joins humanity’s side because he himself decides to.
Brunhilde calls him terrifying precisely because he is impossible to use as a pawn.
Respect for Those Who Face Their Weakness
Buddha’s worldview also explains his contrasting opinions of Zerofuku and Hajun.
Zerofuku, for all his mistakes, ultimately fought against his own weakness and tried to face his immaturity.
Because of this, Buddha genuinely likes Zerofuku.
He values effort to grow, even when someone’s philosophy is the opposite of his own.
Hajun, on the other hand, refuses to confront his own weakness at all.
He is consumed by hatred and destruction, never taking responsibility for the darkness inside him.
Buddha condemns Hajun as far weaker than Zerofuku precisely because Hajun never tries to stand up to his own flaws.
To Buddha, that lack of self-confrontation is the worst kind of cowardice.
Not Just “I Alone Am Important”
The phrase often associated with Buddha in the story, roughly “Heaven and Earth, Only I Am Honored,” is frequently misunderstood.
It does not mean “I’m the only one who matters.”
In Buddhist thought, and in this characterization, it means that each individual is a unique, irreplaceable existence with their own mission and value.
Everyone’s life is inherently dignified—not just Buddha’s.
Buddha’s actions toward Zerofuku, Brunhilde, and humanity as a whole reflect this.
He sees both gods and humans as equally capable of being precious or pathetic, depending on whether they face themselves honestly.
Combat Talent
Even before awakening, Buddha was trained as a royal warrior.
Historically, he is said to have mastered the Indian martial art Kalaripayattu, believed by some to be one of the ancestors of karate.
In Record of Ragnarok, this is reflected in his physical prowess.
He casually spits a candy stick with such speed and precision that he shoots a gun out of a god’s hand, and he hurls fully powered opponents away with effortless strikes.
His raw close-combat ability is then stacked with his supernatural perception and shifting divine weapons.
Together, these make him one of the most frightening all-around fighters in the series.
Perfect Awakening: Alaya Consciousness
Buddha’s signature power is called “Perfect Awakening: Alaya Consciousness”.
It allows him to “know” an opponent’s actions just before they happen by reading the “shimmer” of their soul.
Whenever someone decides to act, their will moves before their body does, creating a subtle disturbance in their soul.
Buddha can see this disturbance, letting him perceive the future a fraction of a second ahead.
Unlike Adam’s divine vision in a past round, this ability does not strain his eyes or body.
He can use it continuously without apparent fatigue, giving him an almost unfair predictive edge.
There are, however, two theoretical weaknesses.
The first is large-scale, unavoidable saturation attacks that render prediction meaningless—though his weapons largely cover this vulnerability.
The second, and true, weakness is that he cannot read a soul that has no light at all.
If a soul is completely shrouded in darkness, with no spark of inner light, he cannot “see” that future.
In practice, almost everyone—from humans and animals to Zeus and Odin—has some light, so this limitation rarely applies.
But it leaves open the possibility of a completely lightless being as a hard counter.
Divine Weapon: Six Paths Staff
Buddha’s main divine weapon is the Six Paths Staff.
It’s a staff whose tip is fitted with a prayer wheel-like cylinder, containing the blessings of six different bodhisattvas corresponding to the six realms.
The staff can transform into multiple forms depending entirely on Buddha’s emotional state at the time.
He cannot consciously choose the form; the weapon responds to his feelings.
Each form is associated with one of the six realms of existence and a specific bodhisattva’s protection.
Only five of the six known forms are seen in the story; the sixth remains unrevealed.
First Path: Heavenly Path – “Twelve Heavenly Halberd”
In this form, the staff becomes a halberd-like weapon.
It excels in weapon clashes, giving Buddha superior reach and allowing him to spin and sweep to parry attacks and control distance.
Second Path: Animal Path – “Perfect Awakening Nirvana Club”
Here, the weapon transforms into a massive spiked club, as thick as Buddha’s own torso.
Its design evokes the clubs of demons from traditional hell iconography.
When this form appears, Buddha wryly notes it seems to be telling him to “just charge in,” implying it’s perfect for close-range rushes and brutal melee strikes.
He uses it to land crushing counterattacks, flooring his opponent with a well-timed blow.
Third Path: Human Path – “Diamond Single-Pronged Sword”
In this mode, the staff shrinks into a short double-edged blade combined with a simple ritual implement.
It functions like a dagger or combat knife.
Buddha uses this form when he needs high-speed movement and rapid slashes.
He dances through all-range attacks, cutting them apart with a flurry of precise strikes.
Fourth Path: Asura Path – “Shield of Instant Calamity Dissolution”
The staff becomes an enormous shield large enough to cover Buddha’s entire body.
It possesses such hardness that it can completely block, and even push back, supposedly unavoidable, arena-covering attacks.
Buddha says he pulled it out because he “got scared,” meaning it seems to appear when his foresight shows an attack he cannot simply dodge.
It represents a pure, absolute defense against overwhelming force.
Fifth Path: Hungry Ghost Path – “War Scythe of the Wild God”
This is the most dangerous form, born from Buddha’s own “poison” emotion—his deeply suppressed hatred.
Even Buddha himself is initially unaware of this form’s existence.
It appears as a huge war scythe with a dragon’s head and a terrifying, jagged blade.
This form is built entirely for lethal offense, focusing on a single, decisive strike meant to end the enemy in one blow.
Buddha uses this scythe to unleash his most destructive techniques.
The form embodies his willingness, in extreme circumstances, to weaponize even emotions he once rejected.
Shared Lotus Fate is not Buddha’s personal power alone, but a technique of the entire Buddhist realm.
Loki describes it as two beings placing their lives on the same lotus—sharing fate—to draw out their full combined strength.
Within Ragnarok, Buddha later explains that this is the underlying mechanism behind the Volund bond between humans and Valkyries.
The Valkyries merge their souls with their chosen human fighters, turning into divine weapons that can actually kill gods.
In other words, the entire weapon system used by humanity hinges on this Buddhist doctrine of shared life and destiny.
Buddha’s knowledge and acceptance of this technique are what made it possible for Brunhilde to rebel against the gods.
Divine Weapon: Great Nirvana Blade – Zero
When Buddha’s Six Paths Staff is destroyed in his battle with Hajun, he senses that Zerofuku still exists within the twin-axe Axe Ya that Hajun wields.
To keep their promise to walk the path of light together, he speaks to Zerofuku’s residual presence and reaches out once more.
Using Shared Lotus Fate, Buddha performs a new kind of Volund with Zerofuku.
Instead of absorbing misfortune, the weapon now drinks in compassion, transforming into a new ultimate weapon: the Great Nirvana Blade – Zero.
This new blade is a seven-branched sword, decorated with beads engraved with one character from each of the Seven Lucky Gods’ names.
Brunhilde calls it an ultimate divine weapon that only a Buddha who has reached the highest enlightenment—great nirvana—can create.
Techniques
Karma-Annihilating Reincarnation
This is a decapitating strike performed with the fifth-form war scythe.
It carries a sinister aura and aims to erase the opponent’s accumulated karma by taking their head in a single swing.
Karma-Annihilating Reincarnation: Eternal
A powered-up version of the above technique.
The dragon’s mouth on the scythe spews jet-like flames, massively increasing the speed and impact of the swing.
Celestial Eye Great Nirvana Slash
This is Buddha’s finishing technique using the Great Nirvana Blade – Zero.
He uses an illusionary feint so that the opponent slashes through a phantom image of him, overcommits, and exposes their back.
Before they can recover or counter, Buddha has already moved behind them.
Together with Zerofuku, he gently but decisively brings the blade down in a simple, clean cut that ends the battle.
Brunhilde
Buddha affectionately calls Brunhilde by a cutesy nickname, treating her more like a regular human than a divine being.
He recognizes her as “half-god,” and interacts with her as an equal in humanity rather than as a subordinate or tool.
Long before Ragnarok officially begins, Brunhilde comes to him to learn Shared Lotus Fate.
This knowledge later becomes the core of her strategy to arm humanity with god-slaying weapons.
Buddha sees right through her: she is overflowing with desire and obsession, and willing to discard good and evil alike to reach her goal.
He praises this, calling it “good,” because he respects unfiltered, owned desire.
When he tells her before Round 6 that he will be fighting from the human side, he also half-jokingly suggests she may have expected that outcome all along.
Her answer—that there is no greater god-hater in heaven than Buddha—makes him laugh, and he agrees that he simply cannot leave such a situation alone.
Brunhilde, in turn, calls him a terrifying man who never moves according to anyone else’s will.
She relies on his extreme independence and anti-god stance as a key pillar of her human-survival gamble.
Seven Lucky Gods
The Seven Lucky Gods act as a kind of divine internal security and purge squad.
They are constantly looking for a chance to deliver “heaven’s punishment” to Buddha for his insubordinate behavior.
Buddha, however, barely bothers to remember their names or faces.
He brushes them off with casual disrespect, which infuriates them even more.
After Buddha’s defection, their leader, Vaiśravaṇa, is chosen to fight for the gods in Round 6.
This matchup leads indirectly to the reappearance of Zerofuku and the rise of Hajun.
Zerofuku
Zerofuku is the “god who spilled fortune,” once encountered by Buddha during his wandering years.
Their philosophical clash over the nature of happiness, and Zerofuku’s failure, set the stage for their tragic connection.
Despite being opposites in principle—Zerofuku tries to remove misfortune entirely, while Buddha insists on its necessity—Buddha genuinely likes him.
He respects Zerofuku for confronting his own inadequacy and striving to overcome his immaturity.
Later, when Zerofuku’s existence is bound into Axe Ya and twisted by Hajun, Buddha still chooses to honor their bond.
Through Shared Lotus Fate, he fuses with Zerofuku to create the Great Nirvana Blade – Zero, turning Zerofuku’s legacy into a weapon of compassion rather than misfortune.
Zeus
Buddha refers to Zeus using playful, informal nicknames, unconcerned with the god’s status as the leader of the pantheon.
He freely hugs Zeus and treats him like a buddy—but still refuses to share candy with him.
Zeus, for his part, understands Buddha’s mentality better than most gods.
When Buddha defects, Zeus is the first to say “no problem,” refusing to punish him and instead framing the twist as an exciting development.
He publicly defends Buddha’s right to choose, pointing out that the tournament rules allow it.
He even expresses a desire to fight Buddha himself, though the slot is already assigned to another god.
Buddha sincerely thanks Zeus for permitting his side-switch.
He also states that he would accept Zeus as his opponent without complaint, further highlighting his consistent respect for personal choice—even in enemies.
Interestingly, while Zeus in mythology is the quintessential fate-imposing god that Buddha would normally hate, this version wins some respect by allowing Buddha’s free choice on the battlefield.
It’s a rare case where Buddha tolerates, even appreciates, a god directly.
Jesus, Socrates, Confucius
Buddha is counted among the “Four Sages” alongside Jesus, Socrates, and Confucius.
These three appear as spectators during Ragnarok, watching the battles unfold.
Confucius, in particular, struggles to maintain his wise-teacher persona in front of his disciples.
However, he cannot help but get visibly excited watching Buddha fight, occasionally letting his true enthusiasm slip through.
Their shared status as world-shaping thinkers frames Buddha not only as a fighter, but as one of the great philosophical pillars of humanity.
The dynamic suggests a shared mutual respect, even if their methods and cultures differ widely.
Kintoki Sakata
Kintoki Sakata is one of the human representatives and an old friend of Buddha.
He calls Buddha informally, treating him like an equal rather than a deity.
After Buddha’s grueling Round 6 battle, Kintoki visits him in the infirmary with “Kintaro candy” as a gift.
Before Buddha even explains what he needs, Kintoki says he has no reason to refuse any request from him.
Buddha asks Kintoki to investigate Siegfried, showing that he trusts Kintoki with delicate, potentially explosive information.
Their easy camaraderie and unspoken trust suggest a deep, longstanding bond.
Beelzebub
Beelzebub is later revealed to be the one who implanted the seed of Hajun into Zerofuku.
He thus directly orchestrated the tragedy that forces Buddha to fight Hajun.
When Beelzebub confesses this to Buddha, he expects hatred.
Instead, Buddha calmly tells him he will not hate him, because he intends to keep his promise to Zerofuku to walk the path of light together.
Beelzebub, intrigued and somewhat impressed, calls Buddha a deeply troublesome person.
He invites Buddha to kill him someday if he feels like it, acknowledging that Buddha might actually be capable of ending his existence.
Other Characters
Loki: Suspicious of the Valkyries’ power, Loki links their god-slaying weapons to Buddhist Shared Lotus Fate, putting him at odds with Buddha.
Kojiro Sasaki, Soji Okita, Kondo Isami: These warriors side with Buddha during his brief standoff with Loki and the Seven Lucky Gods, unwilling to let him face them alone.
Heracles: Never directly interacts with Buddha, but thematically serves as a foil. Heracles is a pure, righteous god who fights for humanity yet cannot fully believe in human potential without divine approval, while Buddha is a free spirit who fully believes in human inner strength but loathes godly “forgiveness.”
Prometheus: Another god who sides with humanity. Buddha may dislike his stance of “forgiving humans as a god,” but since Prometheus was born as a god yet still chose to support humanity, Buddha likely grants him partial respect.
Sun Wukong (the Great Sage): In mythology, Buddha captures him, but in this series, Sun Wukong is so overwhelmingly strong that only Thor surpasses him slightly. The fact that Buddha supposedly restrained him in the past boosts Buddha’s perceived power even further.
Odin, Thor, Anubis, and others: They mostly interact with Buddha around the Loki confrontation and later political fallout. Buddha’s actions draw serious attention from top-tier gods, underlining his importance.
After winning Round 6, Buddha receives medical treatment for his severe injuries.
Halfway through his recovery, he slips out of the infirmary on his own to be alone.
There, Kintoki Sakata visits him with candy and a friendly attitude.
Buddha asks Kintoki to investigate Siegfried, hinting that Siegfried’s role in the bigger picture is critical.
After the eighth round, Buddha approaches Brunhilde again, asking for more detailed information about Siegfried.
Brunhilde’s evasive behavior convinces him that the situation is heavy and emotionally complex.
He jokingly comments that she is “way too deep into adolescent turmoil,” implying that her feelings and motives regarding Siegfried are tangled and intense.
Unable to get proper answers from her, he then goes directly to Odin to demand the truth.
Odin responds with anger, and the encounter nearly escalates dangerously.
Only the intervention of Beelzebub, Thor, and the god of ultimate material, Adamas (or an Adamantine-type power), manages to defuse the situation.
This incident shows that Buddha is not done meddling in divine secrets.
It hints that Siegfried, Brunhilde, and Odin are linked by a secret that even Buddha finds alarming.
Buddha’s fondness for candy is not purely comedic.
All of his snacks appear to avoid obvious animal-derived ingredients, subtly acknowledging traditional Buddhist dietary restrictions—even if the exact nature of heavenly ingredients is unclear.
His label in the arena’s introductions is slightly different from that of other gods, marked as a “god-side representative” rather than simply a “god representative.”
This reflects his special status as an enlightened human elevated to the divine side, rather than a deity from birth.
His characteristic line about “Heaven and Earth, Only I Am Honored” is faithful to Buddhist tradition in meaning.
It emphasizes the inherent dignity and unique mission of every individual, not smug arrogance.
Historically, the idea of Buddha as a martial arts expert complements his combat prowess in the story.
Kalaripayattu, the art he is associated with, is sometimes theorized to be one of the ancestors of karate, adding an extra layer of flavor to his fighting style.
His entire portrayal in Record of Ragnarok—slacker fashion, candy addiction, casual speech, but piercing insight and absolute inner freedom—is designed to make enlightenment feel both human and rebellious.
He is not a distant saint but a fiercely independent person who walks his own path and invites others to do the same.
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